Posts from — November 2007

Hey Folks! I’m working on another entry and until I get it posted, I thought I’d let you see how the experimental Bleu is progressing…

Before I begin this post, I suppose introductions are necessary. My name is Veronica Pedraza and I came to Sweet Grass Dairy a little over three months ago by way of Chicago. I came with the intention of apprenticing with Jeremy and learning the art and science of cheesemaking. Making the transition from the Windy City to southwestern Georgia is not as strange as I assumed it might be. After all, Chicago, with all of it’s cosmopolitan features, stills lies at the heart of the Midwest- which is above all else, farm country. So this post is not about the cultural nuances of farm life as it is about understanding cheese cultures- which are the various bacteria that are added to milk to make a particular cheese. Cultures give flavour profiles, define texture and assist in the ripening process. For me, understanding how cultures work in conjunction with milk and for that matter, each other, is a delicate balance of science and craft. When we speak of culture, we are essentially speaking about microbiology and the cooperation and competition among organisms of the smallest kind. For example, we use a mixture of four types of culture for our Green Hill and the success of each batch of cheese is determined by carefully balancing those cultures. Too much of one and the cheese will ripen too soon, not enough of another and it will fail to ripen early enough. Last week, I had a breakthrough in my understanding of culture when I was making an experimental batch of bleu cheese. We had decided to use a strain of gas producing culture because gas producing cultures create CO2 and thus create small crevices in which the Roquefort culture (the bleu in bleu cheese) might grow. However, the culture we chose was not an acidifying starter. Acidification is necessary to make cheese because on the most simplistic level- making cheese is merely acidifying a base. Just like making vinegar or pickles. Without acidification the curds fail to firm up and do not hold up to the moulding and pressing processes. I realized that little or no acidification had taken place when we went to mold and the curds turned to mush in my hands. Nevertheless, the cheeses turned out pretty good- we got the desired technical holes we were looking for. However, it will be months before we will know how they taste and ultimately if a mistake turned out to be a diamond in the rough. Regardless of that fact, I was satisfied with my days labor as I was able to to identify the cause and effect for why something happened the way it did. This may seem trivial to most of you but there is little information out there for the aspiring cheesemaker. Understanding how all these components work together is sometimes daunting. Given that humans have made cheese for an estimated 10,000 years, it seems ridiculous that there is little written information on the process and that many aspects of cheesemaking are still not understood, especially with regards to culture. I have to admit that I was even mystified as to how these bacteria were eventually referred to as “culture” and in examining the origins of the word itself, found that the definition as it pertained to biology was not as useful as the defintion pertaining to anthropology: “A particular form or stage of civilization.” This seems fitting if you think of each wheel of cheese as its own microcosm playing out a scenario very similar to the world in which we live in- various cultures working together or duking it out to produce whatever it is that we do. I’ll let you know who came out on top in the battle of the bleu in a few months.